


Maybe In Another World

by CityFallArc



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2003), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2012), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Death, Future, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Things Go Wrong, personality change
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:48:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27566287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CityFallArc/pseuds/CityFallArc
Summary: Follow each brother in a different timeline as they deal with the losses of their family. Some have changed, while others remain the same, but one things for certain. They would give anything to have the others back.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

Honestly sometimes he wonders where it all started.  
Most of the time he thinks it’s when they first started going up to the surface. Every once in a while wonders if they had just gone home that first night and hadn’t helped out April and her father.  
Would they have continued to go?  
Mikey never thought that it would end up like this. Not in a million years.  
With one of them left and the others dead.  
Mikey still remembers how he had left with them the first chance he had, burying them in some abandoned farm field far away. A couple stones marking their graves. The masks weighed down by them.  
He still visits when he can get out of the city. Every time the masks faded in their color a bit more.  
Sometimes he wishes things were different.  
They had grown up together as their own little group. It was obvious that even as they got older and would begin to fall in love, pursue their own interests, the whole thing, that they still would see each other.

And then everything was ripped away from him.  
Maybe if he had been more serious, if he hadn’t joked around so much, would they be there at his side?  
Brothers who would now have no chance to find love and pursue their passions?  
He’s crying.  
Mikey wipes away the tears, because it’s no use crying right now.  
It won’t bring them back.  
He still goes around the city, he still sees Karai and April and Casey but it’s not the same without them.  
Karai had thrown herself into rebuilding the clan once more, Casey had become more reckless fighting crime without Raph there by his side, and April had become a reporter, yet still explored her abilities when she could. Mikey still takes down criminals, only killing when absolutely necessary.

They had mourned, but everyone was doing better now. Even if some days were hard for him. Some days he couldn’t bring himself to leave the lair and he just stayed, remembering everything about them.  
Everything was better than before it happened.  
As better as it could be.  
When he would invite the mutananimals, or April, Casey and Karai.  
Mikey would still do his best to make jokes while they ate pizza at the old lair and they would sometimes watch old tv shows.  
Every once in a while turn on Space Heroes or Crognard and pretend they were at his side.  
The empty feeling of having no one to slap your head, or scold you, or try to explain an invention would always be there. Especially on mutation day.  
Mikey misses them.  
And there’s not a thing in the world he wouldn’t give to have them back.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Follow each brother in a different timeline as they deal with the losses of their family. Some have changed, while other remain the same, but one things for certain. They would give anything to have the others back.

Donnie can’t really say he saw this coming.  
Wasn’t he supposed to be the smart one?  
All the time he had spent trying to figure out how he had been the last one alive, and not Mikey, who had some of the best reflexes out of all of them, or Leo, who always had a plan ready and was one of the best fighters he had seen. Even Raph, despite his temper, was stronger than him and could certainly take more than a hit or two.  
He was the brains, not the brawn.

So he finally comes to the conclusion that it was luck.  
Donnie had survived, only by luck.  
No scientific explanation, no math equation, he had just survived by chance.  
And it was luck that left him alone.  
Some absolutely terrible luck if you asked him.  
Even he wished he had a reasonable explanation other than the one that he had found.  
Maybe the moral of the story was that no matter how much he wanted it, some stories just didn’t have a happy ending.  
They were supposed to last longer. His family was supposed to stay together no matter what.

And now he doesn’t even go out to fight crime much anymore. He just sits in his lab and invents things, anything that can help April, or Karai, or even Casey.  
Maybe something here and there for the Mighty Mutanimals.  
Besides April and maybe Casey, Donnie wasn’t really close to any of them.  
Karai had more of a bond with Leo. Because he helped her without hesitation, and they simply just fit with eachother.  
Leatherhead and Mondo Gecko with Mikey. Because he was Mikey, he could befriend anyone.  
Slash and Mona Lisa with Raph. Because Raph loved Mona, and Slash had that relationship from when he had still been just a tortoise.

Heck, the only other person he could sometimes strike up a conversation with that wouldn’t end in awkward silence was Rockwell.  
He even offers help with combat should anyone need it. Anything so he can be helpful.  
But Donnie won’t look at past inventions.  
Too much pain lingers in them, so they sit in the darkest corner of his lab, anywhere as long as he can’t see them.  
He can’t bring himself to throw them away either.

It just shows that his brothers were his closest friends.  
And now they’re gone.  
Donnie wishes that every day in the lair didn’t feel so quiet.  
Heck, he wishes Mikey was there to mess around in his lab.  
He wishes he was smart enough to have saved them.  
Smart enough to have done something, anything.  
But it’s too late now.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Follow each brother in a different timeline as they deal with the losses of their family. Some have changed, while other remain the same, but one things for certain. They would give anything to have the others back.

It’s so ironic that he’s here. Standing on top of the building, watching the city streets.  
Ironic that this was a favorite spot for him and his brothers to watch the world go by, even though they couldn’t be a part of it.  
And now they’re gone. Before they could ever find more adventures together.  
Raph is not afraid to admit that it was hard to even get out of bed sometimes. Some days all he wanted to do was cry and disappear.  
He had cursed the universe for doing this to him, for doing this to them. For taking them and leaving him behind.  
He still watches over the city, taking down anyone who threatens the peace.  
God, he sounds like Leo the way he talks to himself.  
But he leaves them alive.

The old hothead in him wants to hurt them, but he knows that’s not the way he should go. It would only have disastrous results.  
It’s the least he can do to follow his sensei’s old teachings.  
After all, Raph still has some friends to keep him here.  
Sure he still goes out with Casey every once in a while and he still sees April from time to time.  
But the absence left by brothers is too large to fill.  
Maybe there was some universe where someone else has survived, or where they all were well and breathing. They had seen other realities after all.  
Perhaps best to not dwell on what could have been.

Raph really thought it had been over, that they had won. But that was a stupid thing to think.  
The way their adventures went, it never was the end. Maybe they should have seen that.l coming.  
They had been to space, fought beings he never would have thought were real and seen other dimensions.  
Raph and his brothers had gone to the point where it had been hard to be surprised anymore, and yet the universe had kept throwing things their way.  
Until there was something they couldn’t handle.

He’s snapped out of his thoughts by a commotion in the alleyway below.  
He draws his sai, twirling them in his hands.  
And Raph thinks the same thing he thinks every time before he’s about to bust someone.  
If they were here, would it be different?  
But that’s something he will never get the answer to.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Follow each brother in a different timeline as they deal with the losses of their family. Some have changed, while others remain the same, but one things for certain. They would give anything to have the others back.

Leo watches the city like always.  
Filled with filthy criminals and untouchable mobsters who would never see a prison cell.  
They weren’t untouchable to him.  
The rumors had spread of someone who moved in the shadows, leaving any witnesses and gang members dead.  
The police were baffled, but the streets were much safer to walk. 

Leo knows what they would say, tell him that what he was doing was wrong. That killing them wasn’t the solution.  
But they were hurting people, they were hurting families.  
He wouldn’t let anyone else lose their family.  
Not like him.  
No one else would have to bury their siblings by their father and have to look at the gravestones knowing they would never see them again.  
And now Leo knows they rest with his Sensei.  
All because he failed.  
Perhaps if he had been a better leader, if he had a better plan.  
So he wonders if it’s all his fault, and comes to the conclusion that he can make sure no one else will feel the cold, dreaded sadness he has to feel everyday.

April and Casey grew up, and moved off to college. April was smart, and Casey, he got in on a hockey scholarship.   
Maybe they left to forget.  
Karai helped him every once in a while, and he in turn helped her when she needed it.  
No one told him what he was doing was wrong, and if they did, he wouldn’t have listened anyways.  
And besides, it wouldn’t fix all the blood on his hands if he stopped now. Leo has gone too far to stop.

What of honor, he would ask himself when he couldn’t sleep. What about what our sensei taught us?  
Honor had not saved him, nor had it saved his brothers. Even after he had killed any enemies who had a part in their death.  
Leo feels the masks tied around the hilt of his sword, forever reminders of brothers he had failed to protect.  
He readies himself to take down the thugs below, knowing their leader is next.  
Leo will not let their deaths be in vain.  
But even he knows he wouldn’t be doing this is they were still well and alive.  
Not like he can change that.  
He’s just a failure now.


End file.
